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No nuclear threat { January 7 2003 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2003/1/7/latest/9509UNnuclear&sec=latesthttp://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2003/1/7/latest/9509UNnuclear&sec=latest
Tuesday, January 07, 2003
UN nuclear agency: Search in Iraq has revealed nothing
VIENNA, Austria (AP) - The head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency said Monday that it was too early to say whether Iraq was working on atomic weapons, despite more than one month of all-out searches by his inspectors.
"We are not certain of Iraq's (nuclear) capability,'' Mohamed ElBaradei told reporters. He spoke at the end of a top-level meeting of his International Atomic Energy Agency, which censured North Korea for reactivating suspect nuclear programs and eliminating agency controls meant to ensure it is not making atomic weapons.
"I don't think I'd like to speculate on who is more dangerous,'' said ElBaradei, when asked by reporters whether North Korea or Iraq posed the greatest threat.
While, "North Korea (clearly) has a nuclear capability,'' the case of Iraq - which permitted U.N. inspectors looking for nuclear, chemical and biological weapons to return in late November only after a four year hiatus - was not so clear-cut, he said.
The North Koreans have "a (nuclear) reprocessing plant, they have (a) reported enrichment program,'' he told reporters.
"So they have advanced capability, probably more than Iraq because in 1998, we managed to neutralize Iraq's program.''
North Korea late last year acknowledged continued work on a uranium-based nuclear program in violation of international agreements and more recently announced it was reactivating plutonium-based nuclear facilities.
At the same time, it has dismantled IAEA monitoring devices and expelled agency inspectors, increasing fears it was developing nuclear weapons.
In contrast, Iraq, which agreed to renewed inspections only under threat of war from the United States, has denied it had renewed efforts to build nuclear or other weapons of mass destruction.
But before inspections resumed there, it had been largely unaccountable to the world since December 1998.
That was when U.N. inspectors pulled out on the eve of U.S.-British airstrikes, amid allegations that Baghdad was not cooperating with the teams.
By the end of the 1991 Gulf War, inspectors discovered Iraq had imported thousands of pounds (kilograms) of uranium, some of which was already refined for weapons use, and had considered two types of nuclear delivery systems.
Inspectors seized the uranium, destroyed facilities and chemicals, dismantled more than 40 missiles and confiscated thousands of documents.
IAEA spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said Monday that inspectors have turned up "no smoking gun'' in Iraq so far, but "its too early to draw sweeping or final conclusions.''
The 2,400-page nuclear dossier turned over to the U.N. Security Council as part of a 12,000-page declaration on its possible weapons programs also has not revealed "any indication that they have been untruthful,'' Fleming said.
"However, it is too soon to tell.''
Laboratory tests of air and earth samples have also turned up "nothing significant that would lead us to draw conclusions that they have been building a nuclear program,'' she said, again cautioning that it was too early for definitive conclusions.
Fleming said that IAEA member states had provided "some'' intelligence to her agency, "but not much that is actionable'' - that would allow inspectors to zero in on a suspicious area or site.
"We are hopeful that in the weeks to come, we will be getting more.'' - AP
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